Athletes participating in certain sports wherein impact is common, such as hockey, lacrosse, and football, wear protective equipment in order to reduce the chance that they will be injured during the course of play. In ice hockey for example, a player typically wears several different protective garments, such as an upper-body protector, elbow guards, and shin guards. Each one of these protective garments incorporates one or more articles of protective equipment. For example, upper body protectors typically incorporate chest protectors, back protectors and shoulder caps. Shin guards typically incorporate both shin protectors and knee caps. Elbow protectors typically incorporate elbow caps.
A design common to such conventional commercial protective equipment is a polymeric energy absorbent core covered by a rigid non-deformable polymeric outer shell.
Protective equipment of this design provides players with good protection from impact injuries. Nonetheless, manufacturers of such equipment regularly consider new protective equipment designs that might provide improve protection.